May 30, 2017
By Joanne Norell
NOTRE DAME, Ind. – Recent University of Notre Dame graduate and Fighting Irish women’s soccer goalkeeper Kiley Adams has spent her academic career working on research to improve people’s lives. She will continue that initiative in 2017-18 as one of a record 38 University students and alumni to have been awarded grants by the Fulbright U.S. Student Program.
Adams, a biological sciences major who joined the women’s soccer program as a sophomore after playing two seasons with Notre Dame’s club team, will study abroad in India next year. The Edgewood, Washington, native has previously received grants from Notre Dame to serve as an early intervention special educator in Vidya Saga in Chennai, India, during the summers of 2015 and 2016.
Adams is a fourth degree black belt in Taekwondo, is involved in several advanced research initiatives and has been an advocate for environmental issues, as well. She was a researcher and volunteer at the Multicare Good Samaritan Hospital Children’s Therapy Unit from 2009-15, a TOPsoccer “buddy” coach for kids with special needs from 2011-14, a NICU and pediatric therapy volunteer at the St. Joseph Regional Medical Center and a member of the Washington Trails Association, a hiking group that advocates for environmental issues. She is a Sorin Scholar, part of an elite research group funded by Notre Dame’s Center for Undergraduate Scholarly Engagement (CUSE), and has also worked as an undergraduate researcher in Notre Dame’s Language Lab, conducting research on spoken language production and comprehension in adults.
Since its inception in 1946, the Fulbright Program has provided more than 360,000 participants – chosen for their academic merit and leadership potential – with the opportunity to exchange ideas and contribute to finding solutions to shared international concerns. More than 1,900 U.S. students, artists and young professionals in more than 100 different fields of study are offered Fulbright Program grants to study, teach English and conduct research annually in over 140 countries throughout the world.
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Joanne Norell, athletics communications assistant at the University of Notre Dame, has been part of the Fighting Irish athletics communications team since 2014 and coordinates communications efforts for the Notre Dame women’s soccer, men’s tennis, women’s tennis and fencing programs. Norell is a 2011 graduate of Purdue University and earned her master’s degree from Georgetown University in 2013.